Mark Story: Lexington man dreams up dome to house UK football, basketball

When your work phone number is in the newspaper three times a week — and available on the Internet 24/7/52 — you get some interesting phone calls.

So when I picked up the phone some weeks back and heard a guy pitching me that he'd come up with a unique idea for a domed stadium that would be perfect for Lexington, I was not initially receptive.

However, I like bold ideas from outside the proverbial box, so eventually I agreed to let Tom Shannon come to the newspaper and make his pitch.

Shannon, a 50-year-old married father of one, is the facilities director for the Lexington Clinic. But his avocation is sports stadiums, to the point that on a family vacation to Arizona, he made his wife, Tammy, go on a tour with him of the University of Phoenix Stadium (where the Arizona Cardinals play).

It turns out, Shannon has thought of something I had never heard discussed before in making domed stadiums suitable for basketball. He also has a viable reason why such a facility could, uniquely, make sense for Lexington, Ky.

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